Due to parental leaves, the project indeed covered three seasons (2018-2020). Thus far, four publications have been delivered with more being peer-reviewed or prepared. The results of HIVOL have been discussed at two congresses and several seminars. Due to COVID-19, an invited oral presentation on the International Congress of Entomology in 2020 has been postponed to 2021.
Toward Task 1 in WP1, I did a three-season field observation to study the impacts of warming on insect herbivory. I found that experimental warming consistently and substantially increased leaf damage by chewing insects, irrespective of warming duration. This work is under preparation for publication.
Toward Task2 in WP1, I conducted several field experiments to study combined impacts of warming and insect herbivory on BVOC emissions. Plant species involved included dwarf birch, dwarf willow, and mountain birch. Insect species included geometrid moth caterpillars and gall-inducing mites. I leveraged long-term field sites with experimental warming for varying durations (1 month, 9 years, 19 years, and 30 years). In dwarf birch-caterpillar systems, I found that both warming and insect herbivory substantially increased birch BVOC emissions, with a strong synergistic effect between warming and herbivory. This is the first documentation showing the strong herbivory effect and the synergy between warming and herbivory on BVOC emissions in the Arctic. In the dwarf willow-mite system, I found a clear warming effect on willow isoprene emissions, but did not detect an effect of gall infestation and its interaction with warming. In the mountain birch-caterpillar system, I found that caterpillar feeding significantly increased mountain birch BVOC emissions, particularly at low elevations where herbivory pressure was higher in the early season. BVOC emissions varied considerably over the season, following seasonal variation in temperature and light. One publication have stemmed from these experiments with one manuscript being under review and three manuscripts being submitted soon.
Toward Task3 in WP2, I did two field measurements investigating the quantitative relationship between BVOC emissions and herbivory severity. The first one investigated BVOC responses to background herbivory (0–10% defoliation), while the second one covered a broader range of herbivory severity (0–100% defoliation). I found that mountain birch BVOC emissions increased linearly with herbivory severity. One manuscript was recently accepted with one more under preparation.
Toward Task4 in WP2, I run a laboratory experiment in growth chambers using mesocosms collected at our field site to assess joint effects of warming and insect herbivory on BVOC emissions and CO2 exchange at micro-ecosystem scale. The experiment was conducted from 2020 June–August due to delayed delivery of customized growth chambers. I have not processed the data, but my visual inspection indicated that warming strongly increased ecosystem isoprene emissions, particularly during heat wave.
Toward Task5 in WP3: I used remote sensing to map geometrid moth outbreaks in boreal mountain birch forests and integrated it, along with field measurements of quantitative BVOC vs herbivory responses, with the MEGAN model to assess the impacts of moth outbreaks on BVOC emissions at regional scale. Data are still under processing and will be published in the coming year. Preliminary simulation indicated a large effect of birch leaf defoliation on BVOC emissions during outbreaks.
